


As Luck Would Have It

by Masu_Trout



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series)
Genre: Accidentally criminals, F/M, Fix-It, postgame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-23
Updated: 2011-11-23
Packaged: 2017-10-26 11:43:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/282637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Masu_Trout/pseuds/Masu_Trout
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One year later, she finds him in a casino. (Because N is a hard person to let go of.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	As Luck Would Have It

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Pokeprompts, a fabulous LJ community. Hope you enjoy!

The first thing that hit her was the smell of smoke. It was overwhelming, thickening the air and curling around the slot machines, and White had to cough a few times just to clear her head.

 _Wow,_ she thought in a daze. _It’s no wonder these things are illegal in Unova._

She stepped inside, giving her eyes a few moments to adjust to the low light. Once she could see (and breathe) a little better, she wandered farther into the casino, the hood of her souvenir sweatshirt pulled up to hide her face.

She didn’t think he’d run, but that was the thing about N. He was...odd. Steady yet unpredictable, he was the sort of guy who’d give any girl a headache. And yet, she hadn’t given up. Masochism, maybe?

The casino, once she got used to it, was actually rather beautiful. People were standing around, talking and laughing and sharing drinks. Others sat in front of slot machines or card tables, focusing like they took skill instead of luck. The rattling and clanking of the slots mixed with the chatter, making a strange sort of background music. A sign to White’s left read, in large block letters, ALL POKEMON MUST BE KEPT IN POKEBALLS WHILE IN CASINO. She couldn’t help but smile. There was something weirdly funny about people using their Pokémon to cheat at cards.

At first, she figured she’d try for the good old method of “wander randomly until you find what you’re looking for.” After a few minutes, though, she realized that just wasn’t going to work. Veilstone’s casino was huge, and the attached restaurant and hotel just made the area even more impossible to search. She was going to have make a plan if she wanted to find N sometime this month.

 _That is, if he’s even here,_ White thought. _If he hasn’t already run off and left me searching another dead end._

White banished the idea with a shake of her head. Now wasn’t the time for a pity party.

And speaking of plans…

White retraced her steps, walking back out of the casino and into the fresh air. She’d only been inside for a few minutes, but the late afternoon sunlight was still enough to blind. She cursed furiously and rubbed at her eyes as she strode down the road.

Once she was far enough away that no one from the casino would be able to see her, she pulled a pokéball off her belt and tossed it on the ground. With a flash of white light and a snarling cry, her zoroark appeared, crouched on the pavement.

“Hey, buddy,” she said, patting his head. He rubbed up against her, tongue lolling out and ears twitching.

She broke off after a moment, laughing. “Alright, alright,” she said. “We’ve got some work to do, okay?”

He sobered up immediately, blue eyes fixed on her. White could help the swell of pride that welled up in her—friendly as he was, he was still a champion’s Pokémon, and he could be fierce when he needed to.

“Okay, follow me. I’ll explain what we’ve got to do.”

\--

When White walked back into the casino a few minutes later, she was followed by a pale, thin young man with bright blue eyes and a thick black ponytail.

“Good luck,” she whispered as they separated.

He snarled back a quiet reply and drifted off into the flow of the crowd.

Zoroark wasn’t just good at forming disguises. He was good at seeing through them, too. If any of her Pokémon would be able to find N, it was him.

With Zoroark on the case, White was little more than useless. She wandered around aimlessly, scanning for any hints of N. Once, she saw a flash of green out of the corner of her eye, but when she turned it was only a girl in a lime-colored shirt.

_Damn._

A little while later, there was a soft tap on her shoulder. She jumped, spinning around to face the person behind her.

“Oh, hey,” she said when she recognized her zoroark’s face.“Did you find anything?”

Zoroark nodded and, motioning with arm for her to follow, turned and walked back into the crowd. She trailed him past the slots, past a gaggle of drunk guys taking turns on a karaoke machine, and into a section filled with card tables. Dealers flipped coins and shifted tokens, daring the customers to test their luck.

 _Don’t get your hopes up,_ she reminded herself, but it was hard to keep her heart from leaping into her throat.

Zoroark jerked his head to the right and, well. There he was. N sat at a card table, back turned to her, but she would have recognized him anywhere. It was in the way he sat, board-straight and uncomfortable, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else even as the dealer pushed a fortune in chips over towards him.

“Yeah, that’s him alright. Good job.” Zoroark gave her a proud, toothy smile.

 _I should go over there,_ White thought. _Now. What…what am I going to say?_

Her feet locked into place and her hands shook. She’d spent almost a year trying to find him, trying to understand why he’d left, and now that she had him she wasn’t sure what to do. Wasn’t sure what to say.

Suddenly, Zoroark snarled, eyes flicking to a corner of the room. White followed his gaze over to a group of burly men in suits, purposefully striding towards White. She froze, confused.

“What do they want?” she hissed at Zoroark. What if the casinos had special cameras? Could they know that the boy standing next to her wasn’t really a boy at all?

He shook his head, exasperated, and motioned towards the group again. It was only then that White figured out what Zoroark had already seen. They weren’t coming towards her at all. They were heading for N.

Without a second thought, she started rushing forwards, Zoroark right on her heels. She shoved past the other patrons, nearly knocking a few over as she ran to N’s side.

“Come on,” she said, grabbing his hand and pulling him up from the table.

“White?” He looked up at her in shock, and White had a second to realize he probably didn’t even know she’d been following him before her survival instincts kicked in and she was pulling him through the crowd.

“White— what are you doing here? Who is that man?” He gestured to Zoroark.

“No time to talk, she snapped, jerking a thumb back towards the table. “We’ve got company.”

Sure enough, the three thugs were chasing after them.

“Stop!” one of them called, voice clear over the hubbub of the casino.

N’s eyes opened in surprise and he turned back to her. “What do they want?”

White shrugged. “You tell me. It’s you they’re chasing.”

She turned to Zoroark, changing the subject. “Do you know a back way out of here?”

He nodded, leading them out of the casino and through a set of double doors. The different décor and lack of smoke meant this was almost certainly the hotel part of the hotel-casino.

“Hey!”

White didn’t have to glance back to realize the men were still behind them and angrier than ever. She broke into a run, N following close behind. A right and two lefts later, she saw a glass door ahead, the late evening sun shimmering through.

She snuck a glance behind her and smiled. They’d outrun the men.

“I seriously owe you,” she said to Zoroark as she held out her pokéball, pulling him inside with a flash of light. N looked shocked at that, but they burst out the back door before he had time to say anything.

They ended up in a long alleyway tangled with trash and debris. An opening about fifty feet away promised an escape.

“Come on,” White said, yanking N’s hand. He didn’t move, eyes locked on the mouth of the alleyway as three dark shadows detached themselves from the surrounding walls.

“White!” he hissed.

“Alright, missy. Time to give it up.”

White swore under her breath as she recognized the voice of her pursuer.

“The door?” she murmured to N.

“Impossible,” he whispered back. “It’s locked.”

One of the men, (their leader, perhaps?) gave her a friendly smile as he stepped closer, arms up in mock surrender.

“You know,” he said with false cheer, “It’s a bad idea to assume you know the layout of this place better than the guys who work here. And…” He paused and looked around him. “I notice I don’t see your friend. Any idea where he might have gone?”

She smiled back at him, shrugging easily. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

The man, even more threatening in the dark of the alley, gave a sharp nod. The two other men peeled off from the side of the alley and ran back the way they came, looking for Zoroark. White couldn’t help but smile a little at that.

Time to figure out what the hell was going on, then.

“Why are you doing this?” White said, letting a note of fear slip into her voice. “We haven’t done anything wrong!”

She fumbled at her belt as she spoke, hands trembling and making it harder to grab what she needed.

The man dropped his smile.

“That boy there. Is he your friend?”

“Um. Hmm.” White snuck a glance at N. “Well, to be honest, I don’t really know.”

Got it, she thought, hand wrapping around a small sphere.

“Yes,” N said as he stepped closer to White, fists clenched and eyes locked on the man.

And, okay, they might have been trapped in an alley by some psycho bald guy, and his answer might have just doomed White to get beaten to a pulp, but she still couldn’t help but smile at that.

“In that case,” the man said, “Were you aware that you’re friend has been at this casino for three days now, has played for upwards of five hours every single day, and hasn’t lost a single game?”

N froze.

“What,” White said.

“There are…flaws in the system. Patterns. If you’re careful… you can exploit them. It’s not. Cheating. Not…technically.” N, always a fast talker, was stumbling over his words, voice tight with panic. Though she’d be damned if she ever admitted it, White always kind of wanted to give him a hug when he got this way.

“What, and you thought because it wasn’t technically cheating they just wouldn’t care?”

N frowned, a guilty look in his eyes. “I didn’t really…think about it. Just money, after all.”

“Idiot,” she sighed fondly, only barely resisting the urge to pat him on the head. “You are the stupidest genius I’ve ever known.”

The man cleared his throat, interrupting their moment. “Well then. If you two would just come with me, I’m sure we can get this all worked out.” His tone of voice implied that any “working out” that went on would end with the two of them in the hospital.

“Sorry, White said, pulling a pokéball off her belt and tossing it into the alley. “I don’t think so.”

And, okay, maybe that was a little James Bond. But, hey, it felt good to say.

Braviary shrieked as he was let free, flapping his wings and knocking the man over with a powerful gust of wind.

“Come on,” White shouted, grabbing a handful of feathers and hoisting herself onto Braviary’s back. She pulled N up behind her, and let wrap his arms around her waist.

“You alright?”

N nodded and White smirked.

“Then let’s fly!” she yelled, and the powerful bird launched himself into the sky.

For a moment, when her braviary was rising into the air, leaving Veilstone City just a speck underneath them, she thought she heard N laugh.

But maybe that was just her imagination.

\-- 

They eventually came to a stop at the shore of a lake somewhere south of Veilstone. White tumbled off Braviary’s back, sore but laughing, and let N fall to the ground beside her.

They both sat like that for a while, watching her braviary swoop around the lake.

“Why were you at Veilstone?” N finally asked, running his fingers through his hopelessly tangled hair.

“Oh, here.” White rolled her eyes and rummaged through her bag.

“Turn around,” she ordered as she pulled out a hairbrush.

“What?”

“You’ve got ridiculous hair. You’ll never untangle it with your fingers, and I don’t trust you with my comb. So come here and let me brush.”

N looked at her as though she’d gone crazy, but moved over so he was sitting with his back to her. She immediately started on it, yanking at the knots closest to the ends.

“You didn’t—ow!—answer my question.”

White tugged a little harder than was probably necessary and said, “Isn’t it obvious? Looking for you.”

“Why?”

“You know,” she snapped, “Why don’t I ask you that? Why were you in Veilstone? Where’s Zekrom?”

N pulled a small gold chain out from beneath his shirt and showed her the pokéball dangling from the end.

“Well,” he started, “The problem with Zekrom is that he’s…noticeable. And he’s strong, but he still needs to rest sometimes. And there aren’t a lot of places where a legendary Pokémon can rest safely. It’s hard to wander with him.”

White nodded. That was how she’d been tracking him, actually—reports in tabloids and blurry polaroids, following the trail of a large black dragon.

“So, I was hoping that if I made some money I might be able to go on foot or by train for part of the trip, instead of always relying on him.”

“Where…” White stopped and bit her lip. There was no reason for it to seem like she was asking a horribly intrusive question, but that was still what it felt like. “Where are you planning on going?”

N shrugged. “Paradise?”

White didn’t know what to say to that, so she just focused on the knots in N’s hair. After a minute’s pause, N picked up the slack in the conversation.

“Your turn, then. Why were you looking for me?”

White bit her lip. “I’m…” she stopped. “I’m mad,” she said finally.

“Mad?”

“Yes!” For a moment she was afraid she was going to cry. Instead, she got mad, her words coming out as a growl. “ I thought you were my friend and then you went and just left me out of nowhere! We could finally not be enemies. We could stop all the stupid, pointless fighting. And then you just took off! I wanted to find you and punch you for just leaving me like that!” She cut herself off, breathing fast.

It was only when N hissed in pain that she realized how hard she was pulling on his hair.

“Sorry,” she said, blushing, and eased up.

“No, I’m sorry.” N was curled in on himself, radiating tension even with his back turned to her. “I didn’t mean to leave you. I just…I’m a pretty terrible friend. I didn’t… realize you’d care if I were gone.”

She did smack him then, a light thwack to the back of the head.

“You really are stupid,” she said firmly, “But that’s okay. That thing at the casino was actually pretty fun. We need to have more adventures like that.”

He actually laughed for a second there, a little giggle he quickly turned into a cough.

“Okay,” he admitted, “It was rather fun.”

 _This is how it should be,_ White thought as the warm breeze whipped through her hair. _This is perfect._

“Well, I got as much as I could.”

White stood up with a grin, stowing her comb away and calling to Braviary. The bird looked up from the bones of the magikarp he’d caught and took to the air.

“So, she said, giving N a hand up. “You wanna hang out? I’m pretty sure there’s a resort near here that we could have dinner at.”

N smiled.

“Yes,” he said. “I’d like that.”


End file.
